


Ohio Dawn

by palomino333



Category: Original Work
Genre: Machines, Nature, Poetry, Rivers, Rowing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-03
Updated: 2016-05-03
Packaged: 2018-06-06 05:19:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 255
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6739948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/palomino333/pseuds/palomino333
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A depiction of nature and machine in early autumn.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ohio Dawn

Golden rays pour over the river, bathing it in a heavenly glow. The sun, its rising delayed by the season, gradually climbs into the sky. Fog rises from the liquid plane in white wisps.

The glassy surface is shattered by the passing of a long, slender vehicle, its two ends pointed sharply in their respective directions. The boat is framed black against the light, the dipping oars, eight in all, moving in tandem. Water ripples out from their strokes, further shaking and distorting the surface as they expand slowly outward from the minute to the significant.

The hooded operators of the oars are silhouetted, their heads bowed slightly forward as they slide to and fro in a synchronized rhythm. In appearance only, they are unisex, their defining features cloaked and otherwise hidden from the cold.

A ninth person sits before them, her body angled in the direction of the foremost person. An amplified voice, half-concealed by radio static, reveals her gender.

Across the river lies the manufacturing plant, its characteristic clanks and clangs sounding. The loading dock crane slides forward, its silver cord trailing.

The boat drifts onward past the factory, the rowers moving in perfect tandem. 

The creaking and groaning of steel continually drones.

Standing on a dirt embankment, my vision is caught by a dirty orange leaf falling from the branches above me.

Turning, I jog back into the thin forest behind me. The mechanical whirs echo in my ears. I need to make it back to the dock before the boat returns.

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, remember when I used to post things?
> 
> I wrote this piece a few years back as one of my submissions for approval for the campus literary magazine. This was one of the pieces that didn't make it in, though another piece of mine was published that year. 
> 
> The territory my crew team used was an industrial area, thus we often had to practice early to avoid barge traffic. It was a rather strange contrast to pass by functioning industrial areas that were framed by forests and a park. The reason I'm standing on the far bank in the poem is because one of our drills had rowers jumping out of the boat to run laps on land before jumping back into it, and switching off, when it docked again.
> 
> The title refers to the river the boat is traveling on.


End file.
